Custom Video Game “Fan” Art - Created by Carrie Gonzalez
These fantastic fans are individually painted and sold on commission by Carrie at her Etsy shop.
You can see the full range of her fan designs at her DA Gallery
Hi ! When speaking about Sarkesian’s video, you mentioned very good articles about women in video games, could you give me some links ? I’m absolutely in love with your blog and you art and I envy your line sooo much, by the way… :)
Thanks! Here are a few links I’ve dug up that I consider better than Sarkeesian’s “Tropes vs. Women”:
Female representation in games article list
Also keep in mind that I consider a good argument presentation formatted like a standard academic paper: intro with thesis->evidence/research->conclusion based upon evidence. Speculation that can’t be directly proven (ex: “This can make people believe x” vs. “(x amount of people) reported feeling z as a direct result of y”) is not a very solid point of debate, and unfortunately Sarkeesian’s essay depends heavily upon speculation.
http://voices.yahoo.com/from-princess-peach-lara-croft-gender-representation-4568143.html “From Princess Peach to Lara Croft: Gender Representation in Video Games” Could use some more substantiation in some of her statements (“This can bring in the thought that people driving the cars in the game were doing it to get women”—can you prove this? Not that I doubt it, but supplying surveys of male and female gamers and/or anecdotal evidence from children to demonstrate it to the reader would’ve helped greatly), but at least she’s done real research and cited sources instead of just making observations and speculating.
http://mediarepresentation.wordpress.com/women-in-video-game-culture/ “Portrayal of Women in the Media: Media Representation Group” Looks like it was part of a class discussion. Cites sources (haven’t watched the video), links to woman-friendly gaming sites, backs up some of her claims about how female portrayal has directly affected gamers’ perceptions of women. Some unfortunate typos, but otherwise decent article.
http://filebox.vt.edu/users/jivory/JIvory2006MassCommunicationandSociety.pdf “Still a Man’s Game: Gender Representation in Online Reviews of Video Games” One of the sources cited by the first link. A study based on using online game reviews, advertisement, and packaging to see how male and female characters and roles are depicted and perceived among their audience. A bit of dry reading, but provides actual research conducted via scientific method and quantifies the sexualization/objectification of the female image in video games.
http://www.academia.edu/273382/Gendered_Representation_in_Computer_and_Videogames “Gendered Representation in Computer and Videogames” Another paper that brings in Lara Croft as an example of female representation vs. enjoyability as an avatar. She hits on the exact thing that I enjoyed most when I first played Tomb Raider as a teen: “when the game is mastered the player experiences Lara’s mobility, agility and athleticism as his or her own.” Also brings up some interesting points about other researchers’ Freudian (!) analyses of sexualized female game avatars, and a bit of insight as to why there’s such backlash to women enjoying empowering female characters.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nx8RRIiP53Q “The Hidden Meanings in Kids’ Movies: Colin Stokes at TEDxBeaconStreet” A TED Talk in which a father discusses the representation of gender in media consumed by children, and its effects he’s observed in his own children.
The problem with Sarkeesian is that she seems to follow the same rambly vlog style seen everywhere on YouTube (not to mention the numerous spelling mistakes in the captions) and never really says anything. Pointing something out is not the same as examining it. “Examine” entails proposing a hypothesis, gathering examples, and documenting evidence that either validates or invalidates your hypothesis. “Tropes vs. Women” just seems to be a list of instances in gaming, rather than the in-depth investigation of said tropes’ negative effects on women as a whole that I would’ve hoped it would be.
Sarkeesian definitely doesn’t deserve the vitriol she’s received, but she is hardly an authoritative speaker.
Good stuff here!
GAMING THEMED NECKLACES
There’s a whole bunch of new gaming themed necklaces to peruse over at milkool’s Store on Etsy. We’ve featured their work here previously last year and it’s great to see they continue to make awesome video game themed jewelry for fans to buy.
The article comes in the last few months before “Remember Me“‘s release, a dystopian cyberpunk action game with a mixed-race female lead.
“We had some [companies] that said, ‘Well, we don’t want to publish it because that’s not going to succeed. You can’t have a female character in games. It has to be a male character, simple as that,’” creative director Jean-Maxime Moris told Penny Arcade.
Surprising no one, unfortunately. The article goes on to talk a little more about the extreme imbalance regarding leads and gender in the industry:
Looking back at an earlier PA Report, data from video game research and consulting firm EEDAR showed that, from a sample of 669 current-gen games which had protagonists of a specific gender, only 24 of these were exclusively fronted by women.
Less than half had the option of a female lead, including games where you created your own character.
Seems pretty standard - again, unfortunately, this is what we’re used to.
Male-only hero games sold 25 per cent better than those with an optional female hero, and 75 per cent better than whose with a female-only hero.
But this doesn’t tell the whole story. These figures reflect the fact that games with female-only heroes get less than half the marketing budget of titles with male-only heroes.
“Games with a female-only protagonist got half the spending of female optional, and only 40 per cent of the marketing budget of male-led games. Less than that, actually,” Zatkin concluded.
That’s the truth, then - that the people choosing what game receives what marketing budget are helping continue a self-fulfilling prophecy. The majority of publishers continue down the safe route of funding male-only led games, comfortable in the knowledge that, because of this, male-only led games sell by the bucket load.
Remember Me, produced by Dontnod Entertainment and published by Capcom, launches for PC, 360 and PS3 on June 4 in the US, and June 7 in the UK. Check out the HD trailer here!
Reblog this one instead, there is way more information about how sexism in video games is hereby over
What if everyone buys this game ever and it becomes the top seller then?
Wow, this makes me sad :( If I have cash, I’ll buy this game in a heartbeat
:T yup
that trailer is pretty bombin tho
might have to pick me up a copy
(Source: archangeltyrael)
Button Theme
